This invention relates to an ink jet printer.
Generally, an ink jet printer uses an ink which is solid at a room temperature and which is molten when heated. In such an ink jet printer, a print head has ink nozzles through which ink droplets are emerged to a recording media such as a paper. Further, the print head has a hopper for storing the solid ink in the shape of pellets therein. The hopper is provided with a heater for melting the ink pellets stored in the hopper. The print head is movable in a direction perpendicular to a feeding path of the recording media.
In order to supply ink pellets to the print head, a supply station is provided at one side of the feeding path of the recording media. On supplying ink pellets to the print head, the print head moves to the supply station, where the ink pellets are supplied to the print head by means of a supply mechanism.
In order to prevent the clogging of the ink nozzles and to remove contamination of the ink nozzles, a maintenance station is provided to the other side of the feeding path of the recording media. When the print head moves to the maintenance station, a maintenance mechanism feeds a dummy sheet, so that the print head is able to emerge ink droplets to the dummy sheet.
However, since the supply mechanism and the maintenance mechanism are actuated by separate actuators, the cost of the ink jet printer is relatively high. Since the supply mechanism and the maintenance mechanism are not used at the same time, there is a strong demand for an ink jet printer in which a supply mechanism and a maintenance mechanism are actuated by a common actuator.